Over the last several months as we have gone around to the different ward conferences in our stake, our stake president's wife shared an important message with the women in each ward. Among other things she said, this important concept was shared...
most suffering comes from resistance. She said that resistance (in whatever form) usually brings more trials and sorrow while submission brings more peace. I've pondered this idea for months. It holds a lot of truth.
When we resist our unpleasant circumstances, or challenges, our unfair experiences, our illnesses, broken relationships, or the things we are going through with sustained anger, tears, bitterness and hard heartedness, we usually only feel more of the same. When we dwell on our trials and think constantly of how unfair they are, how justified we are in feeling the way we do, how angry we are that we have a particular challenge and we put all our energy into those feelings, we only feed the negativity and we find no peace. All our energies, our thoughts, our negative communication with others usually only compounds the problem and as we resist whatever is going on, we just continue to suffer. As she said, most (she said all) suffering comes from resistance.
Conversely, when we eventually accept (however hard or unpleasant our experience might be) our circumstances and stop resisting, stop being angry, stop being bitter and blaming, we are then freed to move all that negative energy out of our lives and make room for more positive energy and feelings. Our suffering is lessened as we make room for positive relationships, positive experiences, positive interactions with others.
She said that when we remove these expressions from our speech
I can't
I won't
I shouldn't have to
I don't want to
It's unfair
and replace them with these expressions
I choose to
I will
I can
I want to
that powerful transformative things will happen. We will take charge of our own peace and comfort. We will no longer be as susceptible to long periods of debilitating suffering and times when we can feel no peace.
I've seen this in the lives of so many people I know who accept their hard circumstances, however awful they are, and CHOOSE to
not let them dominate their lives. These people are heroes to me. They are like the bright shiny stars that cut through the darkness and bring light into places where only darkness once was. I want to be more like that.
